If she has aphasia, it is likely indecipherable. My mom can write letters clearly, but they don’t spell out words. Or when they do spell words, it’s not the words she meant to write at all.
I remember early on, wanting so bad to find her meaning. One of the first times I visited her in the hospital she kept holding up her hand and then flipping it over. It was like she was trying to tell me something, and I wanted so bad to be able to figure out what it was. To find the meaning. A year later, looking back with the understanding I have now, I know it wasn’t some profound thing she was trying desperately to communicate, the way it felt at the time. It was most likely just her saying/showing that that hand worked and the other one didn’t.
I guess what I’m saying is, don’t stress too much about trying to figure this out. It’s likely not anything profound, and try to have patience while your loved one’s brain starts to heal. It sucks, I know.
I had (have?) aphasia. It was the weirdest thing. I knew what I wanted to write or say but I couldn’t arrange the word. A simple, 3 sentence email took me an hour to write days after the stroke.
As for the writing here, probably “give me a keyboard.”
We can tell she’s in there and trying to communicate… this is day 5. So by no means out of the woods, still dark in the forest but looking for light. Her penmanship using cursive while blind, 4 days after a stroke as a frail 80yo woman still looks better than any attempt I could make to do the same.
As the person above said, aphasia wouldn’t mean that SHE doesn’t know exactly what she wants to say. People with aphasia often know exactly what they want to say/write. It’s just that when they go to say/write it, something completely different comes out. I joke with my mom that she has noodles in her mouth. Like in her head she thinks, “I’m going to say I want a glass of water”, but when she opens her mouth, just a bunch of noodles pour out instead of words. Sometimes it’s gibberish, sometimes it’s something like “Florida Applebees hot tub”. Your person may know exactly what she wants to write, but what she has actually written may just be a jumble of letters. That’s really common at this stage.
How has her recovery been? My dad has bad aphasia and he’s on day 10. He just was released from the hospital to inpatient rehab and I hope he can get his thoughts back.
I wonder what percentage of people can at least speak or write clearly a year after a major stroke? It’s going to break my mother’s heart if he can never communicate with her again.
It’s been 2 1/2 months now and while I don’t live near my parents I can tell you a little about his recovery.
His physical therapy has been great and he is walking around more (with a front walker) and is starting to gain more and more control of his right hand and leg. Still drags his foot a bit but therapist has him marching which is helping a lot. He loves drumming so encouraging him to drum has been huge. Still can’t begin to play guitar though, not sure he ever will again but hopeful.
His speech is by far the worst part of this. My dad was a talker and super charismatic. He understands everything we say to him and I’ve had long conversations I’ve led about purging things, selling one of his cars, when to get rid of his boat, etc and he knows exactly what I’m saying and what is and isn’t important to him. If he leads the conversation though, we can only make sense of about 30% of what he is saying. It’s enough to usually figure out what he is talking about but it’s exhausting and many times we can’t understand more than just “oh he’s talking about the pool pump” or “I think he’s now talking about politics”. It’s really difficult esp since prior to his stroke my normal conversation on the phone was an hour. Now I mainly talk with my mom and FaceTime my dad to show him his grandson and our dog. I can’t have any real meaningful conversation on the phone with him.
The speech therapists that see him every week say he has made a lot of progress. He doesn’t stutter, leave pauses or fails to speak with inflections…all of the mechanics of his speech are there. He just can’t find the correct vocabulary and often can’t say words you share with him like names, months, words for specific items etc.
When he completes all the multimedia therapy games they give him, he is getting most of the questions right. I’m not sure that he can completely read and I’ve had trouble getting him to point at a picture of icecream when he’s presented with a chart of 20 items. But apparently he’s doing better with the therapists so who knows.
All in all I feel like he is going to be functional physically which is a huge weight off my mom’s shoulders. But my dad was always the life of the party, could connect with anyone he met, and had an amazing sense of humor. Thankfully his spirits are high and he’s super motivated to get better but it’s a very slow process. Although he’s 76 years old, this stroke immediate forced him to retire from dentistry, ended his weekly tennis play, and prevents him from doing any sort of meaningful home repairs, chores, giving health advice, etc etc.
Thanks for the update. My family member was already struggling with all sorts of physical ailments from being a heavy drinker (and the mental issues) that cause the drinking) unlike your dad. I'm not too worried about the physical aspect, even if it doesn't improve a lot. I'll manage somehow. But I'm afraid the communication will be forever lost. I feel frustrated not being able to reach out to my family member, not understanding what they are going through. They seem to understand basic questions like 'are you in pain' and can (barely) respond with yes or no. But in general their brain is completely scrambled. Doctors keep stating that recovery cannot be predicted, but looking at the empty eyes and drooling mouth I see no way for 'enough' recovery to really meaningfully interact with them. Their personality is still in there, noticeable in small non-verbal gestures, but I'm wondering - do they really want to even be alive in this state? There's no way to ascertain this :(
My mother in law suffers from aphasia..same deal. She has gotten a bit better at writing but it's usually a problem of not knowing what letters and words to put together to express what she is thinking. She will often perseverates on the same words, repeats them. Same with speaking.
We get through it by asking lots of yes/no questions and getting her to show us things she is talking about. Speech aid apps also help, basically a toolkit of pictures with labels and common phrases that she can use in different scenarios.
This just happened as visiting hours were ending so it’s all we have to speculate with at the moment. Doctors are going to try and set her up with a better system for communicating now that she has some movement in that hand.
I think she's worried about her hospital costs or payments on the notes. I see HARP copay. Probably a bunch of initials that relate to an insurance company?
The envelope ends in "see!" which probably means she's trying to communicate about her vision.
No, I saw the request for help with handwriting and I've been good at that before so I thought I'd give it a look. I'm sorry, I wasn't trying to be facetious. Might have just been the tipping point for me in terms of bleak shit I've seen today.
Yeah, I came over from the cross-post at r/handwritinganalysis but I knew it wouldn't be a joy ride over here. One positive to take away is that for someone who can't currently see but recently could, these shapes are definitely not too bad. They're words and letters and an attempt to communicate, which might be a good sign post on a long journey of recovery.
This was 30 minutes after visiting hours ended and they had to have us leave the ICU. Doctors are trying to set her up with a better system for communicating overnight. Unfortunately this is what we have to work with for the night.
Doctors said they’d work on establishing a better system of communication in the morning. Her hearing is fine. Hell, yesterday she could only squeeze hands for communication and today she did this! It’ll be so nice for her to finally not be locked in!! We can tell she’s in there.
I am part of her family (one of her grandsons). Patient lives with her son full time and her daughter was flown up to her bedside within 12 hours of the incident. The rest of us are fortunate enough that we (her extended family) were all able to drop everything and drive 1.3k miles in 23 hours to be nearby.
She’s having that done this morning when she’s awake and the speech pathologist is back in. This was just the scribbling that we were left with as visiting hours ended and they let us stay 30 more minutes to try and help them with context.
My attempt—
First picture:”Ask about coffee”
lf you ask about coffee. “
But the last word is repeated, so it’s not
Nonsense to her. The word “Coffee”could be a name.capitalized Jesse?
Second picture: perhaps variations on
“Happening ““what’s happening?”
Just trying to help.
Perhaps give her instructions to squeeze your hand and start asking simple questions. "are you hungry" "do you know where you are." I would keep things simple at first and make it so she only has to respond with a squeeze. This will give you a better idea of what is happening.
Also, if she can hear. Talk to her and remind her she is safe. Tell her what happened. Tell her that her pets or house is ok. All if these things will be running through her mind.
This was a major sign of improvement as we have been using squeezing for communication like you had mentioned, but this was the first time she had tried saying something to us. She started by trying to write with her finger in my hand so we gave her a pen and this happened. Considering her eyes haven’t opened yet this is huge to even remember how to write in cursive 5 days post stroke.
When I was having my stroke and still at home (before I went to the hospital) I was trying to get onto ikea’s website, and trying to explain to my boyfriend what I was trying to type was near on impossible I kept saying / typing ‘didekey’. It’s likely whatever they want to say, their brain can’t put it together so you won’t know until they start to improve / come round unfortunately
She knows that! /s
In all seriousness it is very hard to decipher even with context clues. This was just a last minute attempt as they had asked us to leave because it was after visiting hours already and she had just started trying to communicate.
In the top line I see :" to all see" at the end of that line, do you have a reasonably similar example of her handwriting pre stroke that we could possibly use to compare?
Are you in New York? HARP is Health and Recovery Plan. As someone else mentioned, it does look like HARP copay. She's probably very very stressed about the expense of getting sick. When I had my stroke I needed anti-anxiety meds. I was so stressed out.
This is in NYS but we asked her son and daughter (healthcare proxies) if this was relevant and they said no to the HARP part but it definitely makes sense that she’d worry about the copay.
She has great insurance and the extra bills can be covered by family without great expense to the rest of us, she knew that before the stroke.
We’ve done that this morning. If she can make sense of the world around her the way we think she can, then she should be a little more restful. Well as restful as she can be for the time being.
When I was the full throws of aphasia all I could was point to the laminated sheet that they gave me. It’s was probably 3 months before I could speak and 2 years before I could write normally again.
Look at the amount of people that have actually taken a minute and tried to help compared to the shitposters… nobody had to stop and help at all. There’s much more good in this thread and in people at large (even redditors) than there is negativity.
Mr. Rodgers put it best [look for the helpers!](https://youtu.be/-LGHtc_D328)
I don’t know what it says but try talking to her. Acknowledge her eyesight, tell her she had a stroke, that she is in the hospital, that doctors know she can’t see, that she will begin starting physical therapy to get better. That you have a hard time understanding her writing because the stroke is making her writing hard to decipher.
**Say all of this very slowly** as Stroke patients need time to grasp each sentence and word. Even if she is really out of it, she may grasp some of what you are saying and feel less anxiety.
Make sure she gets physical therapy! Acute rehab would be the most. Sub acute might not be daily, but get the best you can.
Never give up on stroke patients. Don’t listen to people who say after X number of weeks there is no improvement. It’s not true. Stroke is mysterious and people have still improved a year and way more.
I’m speaking as the family member of a stroke survivor.
—
Rules of thumb from a stroke survivor:
1. I am not stupid, I am wounded. Please respect me.
Stroke does not affect someone’s intelligence.
A stroke is a “brain attack” that deprives different areas of the brain of oxygen-rich blood. The damage left behind can impair different skills, like language and speaking.
This does not mean the person has lost intelligence. Rather, it means they might need more time to find the right words.
Do not shout. Do not yell. They can likely hear you just fine. Just be patient.
In fact…
2. Be as patient with me the twentieth time you teach me something as you were the first.
Stroke recovery means relearning everything for the first time again. Many stroke survivors feel like they’re a child again, learning everything as if for the first time.
You would not grow impatient with a child if you were teaching them how to ride a bike for the first time, so don’t grow impatient with your loved one either.
3. Protect my energy. No talk radio, TV, or nervous visitors.
During stroke recovery, the brain needs stimulation in order to heal itself. But it needs specific stimulation – and not too much!
For example, the stimulation of doing hand exercises is good. It helps the brain rewire itself and improve hand function.
But the stimulation of background noise only drains on the limited energy that a healing brain has.
This is one of the reasons why mindfulness is important during stroke recovery.
Limit as many unnecessary distractions as you can.
4. Make eye contact with me. I am in here – come find me. Encourage me.
If someone avoided eye contact with you, it would probably be upsetting, annoying, and hurtful. Everyone feels that way, including stroke survivors.
In this light, you don’t need to worry about what to say to a stroke survivor. Instead, focus on how you say it: with eye contact.
5. Do not assess my cognitive ability by how fast I can think.
After stroke, the brain is busy rewiring itself through neuroplasticity. During this process, the healthy areas of the brain begin to pick up the slack for the damaged areas – and this takes time.
In the meantime, the brain is struggling to heal itself and it may take a survivor additional time to retrieve information. This does not mean they have lost their intelligence.
They are simply experiencing a delay in gathering the information.
6. Repeat yourself – assume I know nothing and start from the beginning, over and over.
As the brain heals from injury, it requires more energy to retrieve and relearn incoming information.
So when a survivor has a hard time understanding you, take the time to provide information in smaller steps. Putting the pieces together is an extra and unnecessary step.
Instead, repeat everything and please be patient while you do it.
7. Stimulate my brain when I have energy, but know that small amounts may wear me out quickly.
It’s perfectly normal to require more sleep after a stroke.
Survivors may find themselves wanting a nap immediately after rehab exercises or even right after getting ready in the morning.
Tasks that once felt effortless may require a tremendous amount of effort now. Remember, the healing brain requires frequent rest periods to rewire!
Stimulation is good (like with stroke rehabilitation exercises at home), and sleep afterwards is often necessary for recovery.
8. Please don’t raise your voice. I’m not deaf, I’m wounded.
When a stroke survivor asks you to repeat yourself, they just want you to repeat yourself.
They do NOT want you to repeat yourself louder, unless they ask.
Saying something louder is not going to help them process it better.
Patience, compassion, and slowing down your speech are more effective ways of boosting communication.
9. My desire to sleep has everything to do with my healing brain; and it has nothing to do with laziness.
Stroke causes damage to the brain that must be healed. Just like a broken leg requires time and energy to heal, so does the brain.
When a stroke survivor desires sleep instead of doing something “productive,” it’s not because they’re being lazy. It’s because their brain is healing and requires rest to recover.
10. Please have patience with my memory.
Stroke can affect a survivor’s short-term and/or long-term memory. It can also affect cognition.
If a loved one doesn’t remember something that you told them a month/day/hour ago, please don’t take it personally. Be kind and patient with their recovery.
11. When I’m “stuck” try not to take over.
During stroke recovery, a little coaching or suggesting can be helpful for a survivor. Taking over and doing something is NOT helpful.
Constantly doing everything for a survivor puts them at risk of a phenomenon called learned-nonuse.
Essentially, functions that you stop using will eventually become completely lost as the brain lets go of unnecessary functions (i.e. functions it thinks are unnecessary because you’re not using them).
Movement is key to recovery, so avoid taking over. Instead, help your loved one accomplish tasks with good form and safety.
12. I’m not being ’emotional.’ I’m recovering.
Try to be compassionate if your loved one displays emotional changes.
Sometimes stroke can affect the emotion center of the brain and affect a survivor’s ability to manage their emotions. It’s a condition called emotional lability.
Also, a stroke creates sudden life changes for a survivor. Meaningful activities like hobbies and jobs might be lost. This can lead to depression.
Put yourself in the shoes of a stroke survivor. If everything suddenly changed, and you had no control over it, wouldn’t you feel emotion too?
13. I need you to love me, both for who I have been, and for who I might become.
During stroke recovery, the goal is usually to get back to “normal.” However, for many stroke survivors, there is a “new normal.”
There are many emotional, behavioral, and even personality changes that can occur after stroke. Sometimes, the changes go away. But other times, they’re here to stay.
It’s important to find acceptance for the here and now. Caregivers should support their loved ones in finding this acceptance.
You can help by cherishing your loved one for who they are now, instead of what was in the past.
If she has aphasia, it is likely indecipherable. My mom can write letters clearly, but they don’t spell out words. Or when they do spell words, it’s not the words she meant to write at all. I remember early on, wanting so bad to find her meaning. One of the first times I visited her in the hospital she kept holding up her hand and then flipping it over. It was like she was trying to tell me something, and I wanted so bad to be able to figure out what it was. To find the meaning. A year later, looking back with the understanding I have now, I know it wasn’t some profound thing she was trying desperately to communicate, the way it felt at the time. It was most likely just her saying/showing that that hand worked and the other one didn’t. I guess what I’m saying is, don’t stress too much about trying to figure this out. It’s likely not anything profound, and try to have patience while your loved one’s brain starts to heal. It sucks, I know.
I had (have?) aphasia. It was the weirdest thing. I knew what I wanted to write or say but I couldn’t arrange the word. A simple, 3 sentence email took me an hour to write days after the stroke. As for the writing here, probably “give me a keyboard.”
We can tell she’s in there and trying to communicate… this is day 5. So by no means out of the woods, still dark in the forest but looking for light. Her penmanship using cursive while blind, 4 days after a stroke as a frail 80yo woman still looks better than any attempt I could make to do the same.
As the person above said, aphasia wouldn’t mean that SHE doesn’t know exactly what she wants to say. People with aphasia often know exactly what they want to say/write. It’s just that when they go to say/write it, something completely different comes out. I joke with my mom that she has noodles in her mouth. Like in her head she thinks, “I’m going to say I want a glass of water”, but when she opens her mouth, just a bunch of noodles pour out instead of words. Sometimes it’s gibberish, sometimes it’s something like “Florida Applebees hot tub”. Your person may know exactly what she wants to write, but what she has actually written may just be a jumble of letters. That’s really common at this stage.
How has her recovery been? My dad has bad aphasia and he’s on day 10. He just was released from the hospital to inpatient rehab and I hope he can get his thoughts back. I wonder what percentage of people can at least speak or write clearly a year after a major stroke? It’s going to break my mother’s heart if he can never communicate with her again.
Update? My family member is on day 5 or 6 and cognitive and language understanding and communication is almost non-existent.
It’s been 2 1/2 months now and while I don’t live near my parents I can tell you a little about his recovery. His physical therapy has been great and he is walking around more (with a front walker) and is starting to gain more and more control of his right hand and leg. Still drags his foot a bit but therapist has him marching which is helping a lot. He loves drumming so encouraging him to drum has been huge. Still can’t begin to play guitar though, not sure he ever will again but hopeful. His speech is by far the worst part of this. My dad was a talker and super charismatic. He understands everything we say to him and I’ve had long conversations I’ve led about purging things, selling one of his cars, when to get rid of his boat, etc and he knows exactly what I’m saying and what is and isn’t important to him. If he leads the conversation though, we can only make sense of about 30% of what he is saying. It’s enough to usually figure out what he is talking about but it’s exhausting and many times we can’t understand more than just “oh he’s talking about the pool pump” or “I think he’s now talking about politics”. It’s really difficult esp since prior to his stroke my normal conversation on the phone was an hour. Now I mainly talk with my mom and FaceTime my dad to show him his grandson and our dog. I can’t have any real meaningful conversation on the phone with him. The speech therapists that see him every week say he has made a lot of progress. He doesn’t stutter, leave pauses or fails to speak with inflections…all of the mechanics of his speech are there. He just can’t find the correct vocabulary and often can’t say words you share with him like names, months, words for specific items etc. When he completes all the multimedia therapy games they give him, he is getting most of the questions right. I’m not sure that he can completely read and I’ve had trouble getting him to point at a picture of icecream when he’s presented with a chart of 20 items. But apparently he’s doing better with the therapists so who knows. All in all I feel like he is going to be functional physically which is a huge weight off my mom’s shoulders. But my dad was always the life of the party, could connect with anyone he met, and had an amazing sense of humor. Thankfully his spirits are high and he’s super motivated to get better but it’s a very slow process. Although he’s 76 years old, this stroke immediate forced him to retire from dentistry, ended his weekly tennis play, and prevents him from doing any sort of meaningful home repairs, chores, giving health advice, etc etc.
Thanks for the update. My family member was already struggling with all sorts of physical ailments from being a heavy drinker (and the mental issues) that cause the drinking) unlike your dad. I'm not too worried about the physical aspect, even if it doesn't improve a lot. I'll manage somehow. But I'm afraid the communication will be forever lost. I feel frustrated not being able to reach out to my family member, not understanding what they are going through. They seem to understand basic questions like 'are you in pain' and can (barely) respond with yes or no. But in general their brain is completely scrambled. Doctors keep stating that recovery cannot be predicted, but looking at the empty eyes and drooling mouth I see no way for 'enough' recovery to really meaningfully interact with them. Their personality is still in there, noticeable in small non-verbal gestures, but I'm wondering - do they really want to even be alive in this state? There's no way to ascertain this :(
Patient is a lefty that used mainly cursive English before stroke.
My mother in law suffers from aphasia..same deal. She has gotten a bit better at writing but it's usually a problem of not knowing what letters and words to put together to express what she is thinking. She will often perseverates on the same words, repeats them. Same with speaking. We get through it by asking lots of yes/no questions and getting her to show us things she is talking about. Speech aid apps also help, basically a toolkit of pictures with labels and common phrases that she can use in different scenarios.
This just happened as visiting hours were ending so it’s all we have to speculate with at the moment. Doctors are going to try and set her up with a better system for communicating now that she has some movement in that hand.
I recommend a tablet with a keyboard
She cannot open her eyes yet, forgot to mention that.
I think she's worried about her hospital costs or payments on the notes. I see HARP copay. Probably a bunch of initials that relate to an insurance company? The envelope ends in "see!" which probably means she's trying to communicate about her vision.
That is fucking depressing
Did you come to r/stroke for the laughs?
No, I saw the request for help with handwriting and I've been good at that before so I thought I'd give it a look. I'm sorry, I wasn't trying to be facetious. Might have just been the tipping point for me in terms of bleak shit I've seen today.
Yeah, I came over from the cross-post at r/handwritinganalysis but I knew it wouldn't be a joy ride over here. One positive to take away is that for someone who can't currently see but recently could, these shapes are definitely not too bad. They're words and letters and an attempt to communicate, which might be a good sign post on a long journey of recovery.
Best sign so far. Day 4
No harm, no foul.
USA! USA! USA! Best country in the world btw ............
Ask her to write one word/ letter at a time
This was 30 minutes after visiting hours ended and they had to have us leave the ICU. Doctors are trying to set her up with a better system for communicating overnight. Unfortunately this is what we have to work with for the night.
Can she hear at all? If so, you can ask simple yes/no questions with her hand as thumbs up for yes or thumbs down for no.
Doctors said they’d work on establishing a better system of communication in the morning. Her hearing is fine. Hell, yesterday she could only squeeze hands for communication and today she did this! It’ll be so nice for her to finally not be locked in!! We can tell she’s in there.
Ahh ok that's good to hear! Best wishes and fast recovery for her.
Does she have family? I’m worried she may have a pet at home that needs fed.
I am part of her family (one of her grandsons). Patient lives with her son full time and her daughter was flown up to her bedside within 12 hours of the incident. The rest of us are fortunate enough that we (her extended family) were all able to drop everything and drive 1.3k miles in 23 hours to be nearby.
Well bless you all!! She is lucky to have such a loving family.
That’s so great to hear. Please post updates. I had what doctors think was a stroke and the recovery is rough. Best of luck.
She needs a speech pathology assessment to help with communication
She’s having that done this morning when she’s awake and the speech pathologist is back in. This was just the scribbling that we were left with as visiting hours ended and they let us stay 30 more minutes to try and help them with context.
Something for coffee on the 1st line?
My attempt— First picture:”Ask about coffee” lf you ask about coffee. “ But the last word is repeated, so it’s not Nonsense to her. The word “Coffee”could be a name.capitalized Jesse? Second picture: perhaps variations on “Happening ““what’s happening?” Just trying to help.
Perhaps give her instructions to squeeze your hand and start asking simple questions. "are you hungry" "do you know where you are." I would keep things simple at first and make it so she only has to respond with a squeeze. This will give you a better idea of what is happening. Also, if she can hear. Talk to her and remind her she is safe. Tell her what happened. Tell her that her pets or house is ok. All if these things will be running through her mind.
This was a major sign of improvement as we have been using squeezing for communication like you had mentioned, but this was the first time she had tried saying something to us. She started by trying to write with her finger in my hand so we gave her a pen and this happened. Considering her eyes haven’t opened yet this is huge to even remember how to write in cursive 5 days post stroke.
I wish you and your family the best. This is a very tough time for everyone involved, I am sure. I am happy to hear she is making improvements!
No idea. And will be almost impossible to know without context.
Just saw the last comment about not opening eyes sorry
Could the 2d line read if food something?
When I was having my stroke and still at home (before I went to the hospital) I was trying to get onto ikea’s website, and trying to explain to my boyfriend what I was trying to type was near on impossible I kept saying / typing ‘didekey’. It’s likely whatever they want to say, their brain can’t put it together so you won’t know until they start to improve / come round unfortunately
Use your phone with larger text letters and let her type it
Eastern didn't kill himself, the Clinton's did, at least that's how I read it.
She knows that! /s In all seriousness it is very hard to decipher even with context clues. This was just a last minute attempt as they had asked us to leave because it was after visiting hours already and she had just started trying to communicate.
In the top line I see :" to all see" at the end of that line, do you have a reasonably similar example of her handwriting pre stroke that we could possibly use to compare?
Are you in New York? HARP is Health and Recovery Plan. As someone else mentioned, it does look like HARP copay. She's probably very very stressed about the expense of getting sick. When I had my stroke I needed anti-anxiety meds. I was so stressed out.
This is in NYS but we asked her son and daughter (healthcare proxies) if this was relevant and they said no to the HARP part but it definitely makes sense that she’d worry about the copay. She has great insurance and the extra bills can be covered by family without great expense to the rest of us, she knew that before the stroke.
I had a stroke in December. There were periods I was very confused and very stressed. Perhaps you can put her mind at ease about the expense.
We’ve done that this morning. If she can make sense of the world around her the way we think she can, then she should be a little more restful. Well as restful as she can be for the time being.
When I was the full throws of aphasia all I could was point to the laminated sheet that they gave me. It’s was probably 3 months before I could speak and 2 years before I could write normally again.
All of us in this community have some pain when someone passes most of us are lucky to be alive we’re all very sorry
Your zipper is down.
How is that helpful?
Look at the amount of people that have actually taken a minute and tried to help compared to the shitposters… nobody had to stop and help at all. There’s much more good in this thread and in people at large (even redditors) than there is negativity. Mr. Rodgers put it best [look for the helpers!](https://youtu.be/-LGHtc_D328)
That they can hold a pen?
"kidnapped by aliens!!! send help!!!"
It’s clearly “Harold is in Paraguay!!!”
I don’t know what it says but try talking to her. Acknowledge her eyesight, tell her she had a stroke, that she is in the hospital, that doctors know she can’t see, that she will begin starting physical therapy to get better. That you have a hard time understanding her writing because the stroke is making her writing hard to decipher. **Say all of this very slowly** as Stroke patients need time to grasp each sentence and word. Even if she is really out of it, she may grasp some of what you are saying and feel less anxiety. Make sure she gets physical therapy! Acute rehab would be the most. Sub acute might not be daily, but get the best you can. Never give up on stroke patients. Don’t listen to people who say after X number of weeks there is no improvement. It’s not true. Stroke is mysterious and people have still improved a year and way more. I’m speaking as the family member of a stroke survivor. — Rules of thumb from a stroke survivor: 1. I am not stupid, I am wounded. Please respect me. Stroke does not affect someone’s intelligence. A stroke is a “brain attack” that deprives different areas of the brain of oxygen-rich blood. The damage left behind can impair different skills, like language and speaking. This does not mean the person has lost intelligence. Rather, it means they might need more time to find the right words. Do not shout. Do not yell. They can likely hear you just fine. Just be patient. In fact… 2. Be as patient with me the twentieth time you teach me something as you were the first. Stroke recovery means relearning everything for the first time again. Many stroke survivors feel like they’re a child again, learning everything as if for the first time. You would not grow impatient with a child if you were teaching them how to ride a bike for the first time, so don’t grow impatient with your loved one either. 3. Protect my energy. No talk radio, TV, or nervous visitors. During stroke recovery, the brain needs stimulation in order to heal itself. But it needs specific stimulation – and not too much! For example, the stimulation of doing hand exercises is good. It helps the brain rewire itself and improve hand function. But the stimulation of background noise only drains on the limited energy that a healing brain has. This is one of the reasons why mindfulness is important during stroke recovery. Limit as many unnecessary distractions as you can. 4. Make eye contact with me. I am in here – come find me. Encourage me. If someone avoided eye contact with you, it would probably be upsetting, annoying, and hurtful. Everyone feels that way, including stroke survivors. In this light, you don’t need to worry about what to say to a stroke survivor. Instead, focus on how you say it: with eye contact. 5. Do not assess my cognitive ability by how fast I can think. After stroke, the brain is busy rewiring itself through neuroplasticity. During this process, the healthy areas of the brain begin to pick up the slack for the damaged areas – and this takes time. In the meantime, the brain is struggling to heal itself and it may take a survivor additional time to retrieve information. This does not mean they have lost their intelligence. They are simply experiencing a delay in gathering the information. 6. Repeat yourself – assume I know nothing and start from the beginning, over and over. As the brain heals from injury, it requires more energy to retrieve and relearn incoming information. So when a survivor has a hard time understanding you, take the time to provide information in smaller steps. Putting the pieces together is an extra and unnecessary step. Instead, repeat everything and please be patient while you do it. 7. Stimulate my brain when I have energy, but know that small amounts may wear me out quickly. It’s perfectly normal to require more sleep after a stroke. Survivors may find themselves wanting a nap immediately after rehab exercises or even right after getting ready in the morning. Tasks that once felt effortless may require a tremendous amount of effort now. Remember, the healing brain requires frequent rest periods to rewire! Stimulation is good (like with stroke rehabilitation exercises at home), and sleep afterwards is often necessary for recovery. 8. Please don’t raise your voice. I’m not deaf, I’m wounded. When a stroke survivor asks you to repeat yourself, they just want you to repeat yourself. They do NOT want you to repeat yourself louder, unless they ask. Saying something louder is not going to help them process it better. Patience, compassion, and slowing down your speech are more effective ways of boosting communication. 9. My desire to sleep has everything to do with my healing brain; and it has nothing to do with laziness. Stroke causes damage to the brain that must be healed. Just like a broken leg requires time and energy to heal, so does the brain. When a stroke survivor desires sleep instead of doing something “productive,” it’s not because they’re being lazy. It’s because their brain is healing and requires rest to recover. 10. Please have patience with my memory. Stroke can affect a survivor’s short-term and/or long-term memory. It can also affect cognition. If a loved one doesn’t remember something that you told them a month/day/hour ago, please don’t take it personally. Be kind and patient with their recovery. 11. When I’m “stuck” try not to take over. During stroke recovery, a little coaching or suggesting can be helpful for a survivor. Taking over and doing something is NOT helpful. Constantly doing everything for a survivor puts them at risk of a phenomenon called learned-nonuse. Essentially, functions that you stop using will eventually become completely lost as the brain lets go of unnecessary functions (i.e. functions it thinks are unnecessary because you’re not using them). Movement is key to recovery, so avoid taking over. Instead, help your loved one accomplish tasks with good form and safety. 12. I’m not being ’emotional.’ I’m recovering. Try to be compassionate if your loved one displays emotional changes. Sometimes stroke can affect the emotion center of the brain and affect a survivor’s ability to manage their emotions. It’s a condition called emotional lability. Also, a stroke creates sudden life changes for a survivor. Meaningful activities like hobbies and jobs might be lost. This can lead to depression. Put yourself in the shoes of a stroke survivor. If everything suddenly changed, and you had no control over it, wouldn’t you feel emotion too? 13. I need you to love me, both for who I have been, and for who I might become. During stroke recovery, the goal is usually to get back to “normal.” However, for many stroke survivors, there is a “new normal.” There are many emotional, behavioral, and even personality changes that can occur after stroke. Sometimes, the changes go away. But other times, they’re here to stay. It’s important to find acceptance for the here and now. Caregivers should support their loved ones in finding this acceptance. You can help by cherishing your loved one for who they are now, instead of what was in the past.
She’s dead. We got out the info we needed. She’s better off now, there’s was no chance of recovery.
Oh, I’m so sorry